After his first collection for Lacoste received rather phenomenal reviews, Felipe Oliveira Baptista’s own line, shown yesterday in Paris, continued to explore the theme of practicality with a sexy undertone.

After riffing on dancewear last season, this season Baptista produced a symphony of zippers. The show kicked off with a white dress with brown zippers down the front, with plenty more swirling around the arms, begging to be opened. This was followed by a couple more well-behaved ensembles, such as a beige skirt suit with wide sleeves and a matching straight skirt, then a white a-line jacket and pencil skirt suitable for Emma Peel.

PARIS–You don’t fuck with a Mugler woman. At least that’s what Lady Gaga said over and over in the video that opened last night’s Mugler show at the Gymnase Japy. Gaga’s hair was greenish and in pig tails, and she sported gappy buckteeth. She stared at the camera with a blank expression and swirled her pig tails around. The effect, as always with any collaboration between Gaga and Mugler’s creative director Nicola Formichetti, was provocative and weird. (Also maybe Mugler is making grills now? It looked like Gaga was wearing one-and that would be awesome.)

Sure enough, as the film ended and the models took to the hazy smoke-hung runway it was clear these women were not to be fucked with.

“Chic” is an overused word but it’s an apt one to describe Dries Van Noten’s spring 2012 collection. There was a calm elegance to his show, which opened with boxy separates and shift dresses that seemed early ’60s and couture inspired, all of it in a soothing grey-toned palette.

There were plenty of prints, of course–this is Dries after all. There was a tropical palm leaf one, an etched 17th century one, and a digital floral, and cityscapes (reinforced by a soundtrack infused with city noises) all blocked together at times on the same frocks. Color was gradually introduced but never to shock. First the palm tree prints became green, and then there were shocks of magenta which contrasted nicely with the grey. I loved the cropped jackets, especially the Spanish toreador ones, as well as the perfect printed collared button-downs.